1. Field
The present invention relates to a refrigerator, and, more particularly, to a refrigerator having an evaporator mounting structure capable of improving the operation efficiency of the refrigerator.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, a refrigerator includes a freezing compartment and a refrigerating compartment for keeping food, etc., cool by cold air that is introduced into the compartments after being heat exchanged by an evaporator. A machine room having a compressor and a condenser therein is provided in a lower position of a rear surface of the freezing or refrigerating compartment.
The refrigerating compartment, included in the above described general refrigerator, keeps food, etc., fresh at a temperature of approximately 3° C.˜5° C., and the freezing compartment freezes food, etc., and keeps the food frozen for a long term at a sub-zero temperature.
The refrigerator includes an evaporator to lower the temperature of the interior air of the freezing compartment and the refrigerating compartment. A drain device is located on the underside of the evaporator and arranged along an inner wall of a refrigerator body.
When fins, pipes, etc. of the evaporator are covered with frost during circulation of a refrigerant, a defrosting heater, mounted adjacent to the evaporator, is operated for a predetermined time to remove the frost. Water caused by defrosting is collected in a drain sump, and discharged to the outside through a drain hole.
In the related art, to fix the evaporator to the refrigerator, holders are provided at both lateral surfaces of the evaporator. The holders have upper ends formed with screw holes to fix the evaporator to the refrigerator body using fasteners such as screws, etc, and lower ends supported by the drain sump.
The above described evaporator mounting structure, however, has problems of a complicated fastening operation and long fastening time due to the use of the fasteners such as the screws, etc.
To solve the above described problems, Korean Utility Model Laid-open Publication No. 1999-0028752 discloses an evaporator mounting structure to seat an evaporator in a refrigerator body, and more particularly, in a drain sump without fasteners.
In the evaporator mounting structure for a refrigerator disclosed in the above Publication, each evaporator holder is formed at an upper end thereof with an inserting piece to be inserted into a refrigerator body, and at an outwardly-bent portion of a lower end thereof with an inserting hole. In a state wherein the inserting piece is inserted into a recess formed in the refrigerator body, the evaporator is moved downward until the inserting hole is caught by a corresponding supporting rib formed in a drain sump, so as to seat the evaporator in the drain sump.
Although the above described evaporator mounting structure does not use fasteners, it has a need for relatively complex mounts at the upper and lower ends of the evaporator holder for the mounting of the evaporator.
Further, the evaporator mounting structure has limited strength with respect to mounting of the evaporator, and may result in unwanted displacement of the evaporator.